The Whole Russia Thing

I’m not saying the Russian brou-ha-ha won’t develop real teeth. Hacking? Tampering with voter rolls? Facebook ads influencing just enough people in just the right districts? I don’t know. But let me ask this: when you’re scandalized about something, doesn’t that imply you would never ever do the very thing about which you’re scandalized?

Can we grab some context? I’m getting whiplash.

1. We’ve got righteous Democrats squawking, “The Russians tried to swing the election!” They ran an unlikable candidate who didn’t bother to campaign in key states because hey: “you owe me your vote,” and “identity politics should be sufficient (who needs a message — if you knew where I really stand you’d hate me even more),” and “I’m not him — that’s enough.”

2. We’ve got a president who regularly hammers the intelligence community, causing the “opposition” to defend the FBI and CIA — as if they never steered us wrong (WMD). Bedfellows are jumping around like cats on a hot tin roof (did someone mention “mendacity"?).

6. We’ve got a Democratic party that never performed a real autopsy in 2016, and which avoids crafting a coherent message because they can’t please the people AND their donors simultaneously. What to do? Ah! Focus on the orange monster and they’ll all vote D in 2018.

7. We’ve got corporate-owned mainstream media spending 75 percent of its time reporting on RussiaGate and not enough time on real issues, because they stand staunchly behind corporate-owned mainstream neo-liberals. It’s all the same club (the one we’re not in, George). Ironically, Trump is still the Democrats’ best hope. (Vote Progressive wherever you can).

Why? Distract us with the threat of losing our democracy, so we won’t notice that this precious possession has already been sold to the highest bidder. Add fear to the distraction strategy. Domestic crime: so-so. Immigrant rapists: not bad. ISIS: very useful. New Russian Cold War: bingo! The ugly Russians are nuclear and they’re our historic arch-enemy, although the U.S. spends $611.2Bn annually to Russia’s $69.2Bn on the military (shhh! pay no attention to that accountant behind the once iron curtain).